Cassie tucked Zach and Carter into bed that night with excitement pooling in her belly, even though she knew the chances that Brock would come over were slim. She couldn’t be sure that he’d understood what she meant when she said the door would be unlocked, or that even if he did, he’d be able or willing to sneak out of his parents’ house.
All of it made her feel like a teenager trying to arrange an illicit tryst, and she loved it. The entire afternoon, even when she was on the phone making appointments for two more new patients, she could hardly focus on anything but to wish for night to come faster.
Cassie had never been one for this sort of behavior as a teen, and she didn’t even start dating until she was in college. Even then it was all fairly rational and well-behaved. This time, she didn’t want to be well-behaved. If she was going to have this once-in-a-lifetime kind of connection for a limited time, by God, she wanted to get as much out of it as she could.
Cassie turned out Zach and Carter’s light and closed the door. She went and checked once more that the front door was unlocked, though she’d already made sure at least five times, and then she went to her room.
After sifting through her pajama options carefully, Cassie settled on a long-ish shirt—no pants—and climbed into bed with a book. She tried to read, but it was nearly impossible. What if she ended up sitting there pretending to read and he never showed up?
What if he did?
Cassie was almost starting to regret this situation for herself when she heard a very quiet click. Her heart stopped in anticipation.
Maybe it was one of the boys getting up to go to the bathroom.
Still, she set down her book and waited eagerly.
Brock appeared in the doorway, cowboy hat on his head and boots in his hand, looking a little unsure. “If you don’t want me to be here—”
Before he could finish the sentence, she had jumped out of bed and closed the distance between them. In short order, the door was closed and the light was off, and the butterflies in Cassie’s stomach changed to molten ecstasy.
When Cassie awoke, it was still dark, but she could hear small noises coming from a few feet away. She picked up her phone and looked at it blearily. It was just past four in the morning. Brock knelt beside her and brushed her hair out of her face. “Hey,” he whispered softly.
She pressed her cheek against his hand like a cat and smiled, even though he wouldn’t be able to see it in the dark. “I didn’t want to wake you, but I should get back before anybody gets up. You still have a couple more hours before you need to be up, though.”
She wanted him to stay. What if he just stayed? For the next day and the night after that and the night after that—
No, that wouldn’t work, of course.
So Cassie just nodded, enjoyed one last kiss that she could feel all the way to her toes and then said goodbye.
After he was gone, her bed felt unpleasantly empty, and Cassie wondered if this romance was such a good idea after all. Just as with every time that thought had come up before, she knew she would take every second with Brock McNeal she could get.
Even if it was only for another seven days.
* * *
BROCK WALKED INTO Cassie’s house the next morning after checking to see that the door was still unlocked. Though it felt a little odd, it was nice, too, and the memories of the night before flooded through him pleasantly. He pushed them away, though, because today would be about Zach and Carter, not him and Cassie.
The living room was empty, so he went to the kitchen in search of the home’s occupants. Nobody was there, either, but it also felt cool and inviting, and he lingered there for a moment, enjoying the atmosphere of a quiet country home. His tiny apartment in Dallas lacked any feeling of home—though a good deal of that probably had to do with how little he was there. Being out on the rodeo circuit for months at a time kept him from ever feeling really settled. Heck, he’d probably slept in his truck more times than he’d slept in his own bed.
But there was more to it than that. This wasn’t just a kitchen in anybody’s house. This was Cassie’s kitchen, which already showed signs of her personality despite the boxes still sitting in the corner. A blue spoon rest with painted daisies all over it sat beside the stove, and an oven mitt that looked like a dinosaur’s mouth, complete with cloth teeth, hung on the wall. He could imagine her attacking Carter with it before pulling something out of the oven.
He felt a sudden twinge of wistfulness and walked out of the kitchen toward the hallway. He needed to find Cassie, so he started walking toward her bedroom. Just the thought of being alone in there with her again sent adrenaline through his veins, but he knew the boys were somewhere close by, and that fantasy was going to need to wait.
As he walked down the hall, he stopped when he heard murmuring through the open doorway of the twins’ room. Glancing inside, he saw Cassie, Zach and Carter on the floor, driving toy cars around on a rug covered in street designs, each one occasionally screeching to a halt or flipping over in dramatic car crashes. Cassie looked beautiful, the lack of sleep from the night before undetectable. It even seemed like her smile was brighter than usual, and there was a glitter in her eye that he liked to think was his doing.
Or maybe she was just enjoying playing with her sons, he thought when he saw her car fly into the air as she laughed. That sound rolled through him as only her laugh could. He watched the little family, not wanting to spoil the moment.
Then Carter saw him and ran over with a car in his hand. “Here,” he told Brock, handing him the tiny car. “You can use the red one.”
“Momma said we could play cars until it was time to go because we got ready early,” Zach said.
Brock understood he was expected to play cars with them, though it was a strange thing, to drive tiny cars along tiny streets. Still, he dutifully knelt down on the floor and started running the car along one of the streets, feeling a little foolish.
“This isn’t really your thing, is it?” Cassie asked him under her breath.
No good answer came to him, so he simply replied, “I usually drive a truck, myself.”
“Here’s a truck!” Zach said, dropping a small silver truck in front of Brock.
Brock picked up the truck and studied it. “This is actually pretty similar to mine,” he commented.
“Yeah,” Zach said. “I got it with Aunt Emma. She said we could have one car each, but I picked a truck instead because it looks like yours.”
Brock stared at the young boy for a few seconds, astonished. These two kids constantly surprised him.
“There you go,” Cassie said, her voice soft. “Now you have a truck to drive that’s just like yours.”
Brock could only nod, and for several seconds, the only sounds were the explosions the boys created as they slammed vehicles together.
“Where is your truck going?” Carter asked Brock as he drove along the street. “To the rodeo to ride bulls?”
He sounded so excited about the prospect of bull riding that Brock’s mind whirred quickly. There was no way he was going to encourage Carter’s newfound obsession with riding bulls. “Nope,” he told Carter. “My truck is going to the carnival to ride the Ferris wheel and eat cotton candy. Maybe while he’s there he’ll play one of the games and try to win your momma a stuffed animal.”
Carter’s car pulled up alongside Brock’s. “Me, too! I want to go to the carnival, too!”
“We like carnivals, don’t we?” Cassie asked her sons, who both nodded.
“Well, you missed the spring fair, which is big and not too far away. But the Halloween carnival will be here before you know it.”
“Will you take us?” Zach asked, looking straight at Brock.
“I...” he started, but he didn’t know what to say.
He was leaving town soon, but he could come back for the Halloween carnival. Brock could just imagine Zach and Carter picking out pumpkins and screaming at the top of their lungs as they all whirled around on the teacups.
Or would it just be better to make a clean break and avoid all three of them as much as possible? His heart and his brain had two very different answers.
And none of that addressed the fact that Cassie might not even want him around after these few days were over. Once she was done with her training wheels, she might be ready for something more permanent with somebody else.
Cassie looked Zach in the eye, her face serious. “Remember what we talked about? How Brock needs to go back to work and won’t be around anymore?”
Zach looked glum, but he nodded. Brock couldn’t feel worse if he tried.
* * *
CASSIE LOOKED AT the man and two boys. They were all still moving their vehicles around, but none of them seemed very happy at the prospect of Brock moving on.
He didn’t contradict her, though, so it was clear that was still the plan. Seven more days together, and then he’d be off for the rodeo.
“We should get going,” Cassie said as she stood, pushing away her unpleasant thoughts. “It’s time for horse camp!”
Zach and Carter jumped up, their good moods restored at the thought of horses. “Will we get to ride one?” Carter asked eagerly.
“I don’t know. What do you think, Brock?” she asked, trying to turn his mood around, too.
Brock seemed to think carefully about the question, the way people often did around very young children. It was clear he was catching on quick. “I’m not sure how the Stuarts run their camp, but I’m guessing you’ll meet the horses first, pet them, learn about them, and after all that you might ride them. But only if you feel ready for it.”
Cassie could tell his last sentence was directed toward Zach, who seemed a little nervous at the prospect of hopping onto a horse’s back. For all his agreement with Carter’s talk about bull riding, Zach would need a bit of time before he was ready to ride any large animal.
Soon they were all settled into Cassie’s SUV and on their way to the Stuart Ranch. While the boys discussed camp noisily in the back, Brock sat quietly in the passenger seat. Cassie redirected her thoughts away from the cowboy beside her and onto the tasks for the day. Buy bedding, toys and food for Freckles; then get him from the shelter. By the time he was settled at home, it would likely be time to pick up the boys.
She tried not to feel too disappointed about that. She’d had more amazing times in Brock’s arms than most people got in their entire lives, so could she really complain if they had no opportunity to be alone that day?
Cassie knew the answer to that. Of course she could complain, as long as she was the only one to hear it.
When she pulled onto the dirt driveway of the Stuart Ranch, Zach and Carter climbed out. They shouted their goodbyes and thundered toward the small group of young children surrounding Grandma Stuart. Cassie waved to their retreating backs and put her car in reverse.
“I wish we had time to say hi to Rosalind and Diamond,” Cassie said, “but we have too much to do to get the dog settled before camp is over.”
Cassie hoped Brock wouldn’t say anything about the boys being sad he was leaving. Frankly, she was, too, and she didn’t want to talk about it. Better to enjoy the little time they had.
“I think they’re going to be over the moon about Freckles,” Brock said.
Cassie was relieved, and they talked about the silly dog the entire way to the pet shop. As they walked through the giant store, Cassie and Brock laughed and argued good-naturedly as they chose the perfect bedding, food and collar for little Freckles. “This pup is going to be pretty spoiled for a ranch dog, I imagine,” Brock commented as they dropped a half-dozen toys into their already full cart.
Cassie knew she should watch her spending more carefully, but now that the hay was being baled and she had a few patients, she couldn’t help but feel more secure, and she was willing to splurge on the adorable mutt. “I think he’ll prefer relaxing in his bed and terrorizing the house over herding cattle. Maybe I’ll need to get another dog someday just for that purpose.”
Brock smiled at her. “You’re going to have cattle?”
“A pretty smart cowboy mentioned it to me once, and I think it’s a good idea,” she said, thinking back to the day they’d walked along the fences.
It had been only a few days before, but so much had happened since then.
“I think we can get your paddock finished in a day or two if we really put in the time, and then Diamond and Rosalind can come home,” Brock told her, clearly thinking about that walk, too.
With the rush to finish her office, that had been pushed to the wayside. If they could get it done, though, her ranch would be on its way to matching her dream.
And they only had seven days before he left, so time was not her friend.
Brock picked up a container of dog biscuits and tossed it in the heaping cart on their way to the cashier.
“How about we buckle down on that tomorrow? Amy’s leaving in the morning, but after that, I’ve got the entire day free. We should be able to fix it and paint it, if we’re quick about it, and maybe even pick up the horses the day after,” he said.
Cassie agreed, then turned to her current objective: becoming a dog owner.
And that seemed to be a much more expensive task than she’d previously thought, judging by the numbers jumping up on the cash register. She was starting to rethink the dozen top-of-the-line dog bones and the collar with the studs when Brock whipped out his credit card.
“Got a splinter there, Brock?” she asked, blocking the credit card machine with her hand.
Brock rolled his eyes at her attempt to keep him from paying. “It was my idea for you to get a dog. You’ll have to clean up his poop every day. I should at least pay for his bedding, even if you decided against the one with the horseshoe pattern.”
After a brief argument, she relented, secretly happy she didn’t need to put anything back in order to pay for it. Soon, the items were packed into the back of her car and they were off to get Freckles.
When they parked in front of the shelter, Cassie turned to Brock. “Ready to pick up a dog?” she asked.
Then she noticed that he was distracted, looking out the window back the way they’d just driven. Before she could ask him what he’d seen, he turned back to her and gave her a kiss that made her toes curl. “You grab Freckles. I’ll meet you back here faster than green grass through a goose.”
He got out of the car and was gone before she could recover her wits and understand what he’d said enough to find out where he was going.
All Cassie could do was wonder at his behavior, as well as his choice in idioms, and smile because of the kiss as she greeted Freckles, who seemed even more excited and loving than the day before, if that was possible.
By the time Freckles was secured in his crate in the back seat of the car, Brock was back, a large box in his arms. “Don’t ask,” he said the moment she opened her mouth.
Cassie closed her mouth again and got in the car. Brock seemed very happy with himself, so she could only imagine he’d purchased something ridiculous for the dog and wanted it to be a surprise. Probably something cowboy-themed to make up for her vetoing his choice of dog bed.
They got back to her place and unloaded all the purchases, except for one. Brock left the mystery box in the car, warning her not to touch it.
As Cassie had feared, by the time Freckles was settled in, it was time to pick up the boys. She started to say goodbye to the dog when Brock shook his head. “How about I go get the boys? That way you can be here waiting for them with Freckles.”
Cassie loved the idea, so she tossed Brock her keys and settled in to wait, petting the sweet little animal, whom she already considered part of the family. Freckles scrambled into her lap and snuggled close, licking her hand at every opportunity.
Almost as soon as Brock left, Cassie’s phone rang. A quick glance told her it was Emma.
“Hello?” she said.
“Hey Cassie, Daniel Forrester needs to come in for a doctor’s appointment.”
Cassie could hear bickering in the background and Emma say, “Yes, you do, so stop being a baby, Danny.”
The name sounded familiar. “Danny’s your cousin, right?”
Emma had told Cassie about her cousin who was currently staying in the tiny apartment above her bakery until he “got settled in town,” in Emma’s words.
“Yep, my cousin. He has some weird pain in his leg every once in a while, and despite what he says, he should get it checked out,” Emma explained, though it sounded like she was talking more to her cousin than to Cassie.
“Is it something he should go to the hospital about?” Cassie asked.
“Listen,” Emma said quietly, “I’ll be lucky if I can get him to go see you. There’s no way he’s going to the hospital unless you tell him it’s life-or-death. Which it could be!” she exclaimed much louder, likely in the direction of Danny.
Cassie tried not to laugh. “Do you want to bring him in right away, or can it wait until after Mrs. Edelman’s appointment next week?”
“Next week would be great. He will see you then.” Emma said.
Cassie laughed as she heard Emma say, “Yes, you will!” to her cousin as she shut off the phone.
That was going to be an interesting appointment.
Good. Anything to keep her mind off Brock leaving.
She had already scheduled three other appointments for the same day as Mrs. Edelman’s. The day after the rodeo.
It just seemed best to keep herself busy.
Luckily, she heard the car pull up and was able to get her mind onto Freckles and her children. Better topics, for sure.
The door opened and Freckles jumped out of her lap, running toward the noise as Zach and Carter ran into the house. They entered the living room with Brock behind them, amazed at the dog that came up to greet them.
“A puppy!” Zach shouted as he and Carter kneeled down to meet Freckles.
Cassie was just as surprised as they were. “Where did you get those hats?” she asked.
The boys were both sporting child-size cowboy hats. They were so enthralled in the dog that they didn’t hear her question, but the answer became obvious when she saw that Brock was holding another hat. He held it out to her. “I thought they should have cowboy hats after their first real horse experience. And you should have one, too, now that you’re a rancher.”
She no longer had any doubt about what his mysterious box contained. She didn’t know what to say as he placed the hat on her head, and it took everything in her not to pull him into a kiss right then and there.
“Thank you,” she said, her voice soft as she held back happy tears.
He just smiled back and tipped his own hat, the grown-up version of Zach and Carter’s, at her. Then he turned to watch the boys play with their new dog. Cassie did after a moment, too.
“Is he ours forever?” Zach asked, looking at her with wide eyes, his hands low so Freckles could lick them.
Cassie nodded. “Yep, he’s our dog now. We adopted him. His name’s Freckles.”
“Freckles is a silly name,” Carter commented.
Cassie worried there was going to be a whole argument over the pup’s name, but Brock kneeled down next to them and said, “There’s a rodeo bull with the same name. Crazy fella. I’ve been lucky enough that I haven’t ever tried to ride him. He’d chew me up and spit me out.”
Zach and Carter’s eyes grew wide, “Really?” Zach asked.
“A bull named Freckles?” Carter added.
He nodded. “Yep. Freckles.”
“Cool!” they said in unison, then bent back down to the dog.
Brock stood again and smiled at Cassie. Once he was close enough that they wouldn’t be overheard, she whispered, “There isn’t really a scary bull named Freckles, right?”
Brock put a hand over his heart. “God’s honest truth.”
Cassie laughed.
The rest of the evening was spent gathered around the new puppy, exclaiming at every wag of his tail, and the boys chattering excitedly about horse camp. Finally, though, she saw that the boys’ eyes were drooping and she looked at the clock. “It’s past your bedtime, guys. Go brush your teeth and I’ll put Freckles away in his crate.”
Zach and Carter protested, but once they saw that their mother wasn’t going to budge, they got up and did as she said. On their way out of the room, Carter walked up to Brock and craned his head so he could look the grown man in the eyes. “Will you tell us a bedtime story about riding in the rodeo?” Carter asked.
Cassie was about to cut in, reassuring Brock he didn’t need to and placating Carter with a bedtime story about their father, but before she could say anything, Brock was ruffling Carter’s hair. “Sure, buddy,” he said.
Carter and Zach ran off to brush their teeth, looking excited.
Cassie said nothing as she settled Freckles down for the night, but her heart felt twisted tight inside her. She was touched by her boys’ attachment to Brock, but at the same time saddened that in just a few days they would need to say goodbye.
* * *
IN ONLY A few short minutes, the two boys lay in their bunks, looking expectantly at Brock. For a moment he felt a kind of stage fright. They were just so attentive. At least he had some good stories.
“One time a few years back,” he began, “I was all set to ride a bull named Whirlwind. He was the biggest, meanest bull I’d ever had to ride.”
“Were you scared?” Zach asked in a whisper, his eyes the size of saucers.
Brock wanted to laugh at how serious the boy was, but he held it in. “Sure I was scared. Wouldn’t you be?”
Zach nodded solemnly.
“But I’d prepared and practiced, and I wasn’t about to give up just because I was scared.”
“Did you get hurt?” Carter asked, leaning forward in his bed.
“No, but it was a close thing. I thought I was going to get thrown the moment they opened the chute, but I managed to stay on for the whole eight seconds.”
“Did you win?” Cassie asked.
Brock looked over to see her leaning against the green wall of the room, listening to the story. He smiled at her. “Yep. Biggest purse I ever got.”
“I want to ride bulls!” Carter exclaimed.
“Me, too!” Zach said.
As much as Brock enjoyed riding on the circuit, the idea of these sweet little boys jumping on the back of a crazy bull was too much for him. “Whoa, pardners,” he said. “My story isn’t over yet.”
The two settled down as Brock tried to come up with something to add that might keep them from bull riding. His most recent ride came back to him, and he told the boys, “After I jumped off the bull and was waving to the crowd, Whirlwind got free and came after me!”
“Oh, no!” Zach shouted.
“Oh, yes,” Brock said as seriously as he could. “He stomped his big scary hoof this close to my head.” He held up his finger and thumb an inch apart. “And I learned that riding bulls can be very very dangerous and should only be done by people who practice a lot.”
Zach and Carter seemed satisfied with the ending and snuggled down in their beds. Cassie went over and kissed each of them good-night, and then she walked with Brock down the hallway, toward the door. “Whirlwind didn’t really almost kill you, right?” she asked.
“Nah. I just added that at the end,” he said, feeling a twinge of guilt at the omission that it had happened with another bull just a few days ago.
Cassie seemed relieved. At the door, Cassie put her hand against his chest and they shared a long, lingering kiss. Brock almost asked to stay, but he knew she would say yes and he wasn’t sure if he could make himself leave in the middle of the night again. Plus, his sister had her flight out of the country early in the morning. He needed to be home.
Still, he didn’t want to go. If he went home, the next time he saw her, they’d only have six more days left.
But he said good-night and turned away, pausing for a long moment to wait for the click of the lock that never came, and then he walked slowly back to his parents’ house, his mind whirling between Cassie, her unlocked door and his interactions with the twins.
He’d always said he didn’t want children, but Zach and Carter made something tug inside him he hadn’t felt before. Was he willing to make children a part of his life, even if it meant leaving them without a father?
He pictured a bull’s hoof slamming down next to his head, a slip of his hand while rock climbing that nearly dropped him a thousand feet, his motorcycle sliding around cars at breakneck speeds.
No. He couldn’t do that to kids. He knew that, so why was this suddenly a question for him?
Brock reached the dark house and closed the door behind him, wishing he could shut out the feelings that had followed him home. He took off his cowboy hat, leaned against the door and drew in a deep breath, letting it out slowly.
“What’s going on, Brock?” Amy asked.
Brock looked around, surprised. He’d thought he was alone and hadn’t noticed his sister sitting in the corner of the room, working on her laptop, her foot propped high as usual. She closed her computer. “You aren’t really falling in love with her, are you?” she asked, her voice worried.
He wanted to answer that he wasn’t, but he knew it would sound like a lie. “Maybe,” he said. “But it doesn’t matter. Neither of us is looking for anything long-term.”
He didn’t want to really examine his feelings for Cassie. “She has kids, which is the main problem,” he said.
“Oh, yeah, your no-kids rule,” Amy responded.
“I just don’t want to leave some kids without a father, okay?” he said.
He knew he was sounding defensive, but it was true.
He thought it best to change the topic. “Do you do dangerous stuff while you’re out there in the world?” he asked, thinking back to a conversation he’d had with their ma a few days before.
Amy looked at him thoughtfully. “I don’t hide in my hotel room, if that’s what you mean. But dangerous? Not particularly. I like to travel, but that doesn’t mean I have a death wish or anything. I write about interesting places, not about free-climbing cliffs or jumping out of airplanes.”
Brock tried to hide his grimace. He’d done both of those things in the last couple of years. Did that mean he had a death wish?
It wasn’t a question he wanted to know the answer to.
“Listen, Brock, do you want to have kids?” Amy asked.
Brock’s answer a few days before was a firm no. Now, though...
“Do you?” he asked, more to delay answering than anything else.
“We’re not talking about me here,” she said.
Brock knew Amy well enough to know when she was holding something back, and this was definitely one of those times. He was about to ask her what it was when she stood up, careful to keep her weight off her sore ankle. “I’m going to bed,” she said, grabbing a crutch that their pop had found somewhere in the attic.
Brock guessed she’d known what he was going to ask and considered stopping her, but he just said good-night and let her leave the room. If she didn’t want to tell him, that was her choice.
Brock glanced out the window and saw that Cassie’s bedroom light was still on, and he put his hat back on. Whatever self-control he had left him, and he knew he’d need to find some way to leave Cassie’s arms before morning.
What else could he do?